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It looks like the scooters cost $1 to unlock and $0.15/min thereafter. I found one in Arlington over the weekend. They beep loudly if moved without paying which is annoying if just getting them out of the way.

Saw one of these motorized rental scooters abandonded at the corner of the Mass. Ave. bridge and Beacon St. a few nights ago. This is a very busy intersection for pedestrians, cyclists and joggers -- it was dumped partially blocking the sidewalk without any consideration for those of us who use sidewalks.

They're getting plenty of use in Somerville though. And amusingly enough yesterday morning there was one inside a shelter on the inbound platform at Sullivan. I can't believe someone actually rode one into the station and then carried it down the stairs.

- Privatizing a public good (sidewalk)
- Accessibility issues due to blocked sidewalks

I am not a particular fan of NIMBY and can acknowledge a number of real benefits. But if this is anything like traffic associated with "deregulating" taxis via Uber/Lyft, sidewalks are going to become quite difficult to traverse.

So what? You can bike around here without any special equipment through the end of December, usually. Speaking from experience. Yes, fewer people ride but that's not a good excuse. I bet fewer people ride because the city treats bike lanes as sidewalks as 3rd-class dump for snow.
Please see how Montreal treats snow removal. And how they and Quebec City have removable bike lane stanchions that form protected bike lanes in the riding season but go away during snow removal season.

Car specific taxes barely pay half the cost of driving infrastructure, even if you ignore a lot of indirect costs like damage and injuries from accidents, pollution, enforcement of laws, etc. So at least half of the roads your car needs are paid for with general taxes. Thus, you are getting subsidized by non drivers.

Then buy a car and/or rent a car and quit being so upset about helping to pay for roads that are used by: ambulances, fire engines, garbage trucks, construction vehicles, police officers, cyclists, taxis, tractor trailers which bring food to grocery stores, city busses, handicapped-accessible vans which bring the disabled to doctor appointments, and so on and so forth. If you don't think you benefit fromthe city having paved roads then you might want to rethink that silly notion.

As a tax-payer I help pay for services that I do not use, but I'm fine with that because we live in society and it's not all about me, me, me.

It looks like you can buy an electric scooter like the BIRD one for about $500, which isn't bad at all. That's the same as the cost of a decent bicycle. Unlike bikes, scooters are much more portable, and you could easily use one to get to work and then bring it up to the office with you. You can even bring one on public transit very easily. Whether or not public dockless electric scooters like this become a big thing, I suspect we'll see a lot more people buying them for everyday use.

If the city/region/state purchased and owned BIRD like scooters and allowed people to use Charlie cards to unlock them. Governments already subsidize other forms of transportation (including docked bikes), why not do the same with scooters?

As it stands we're letting a private company profit from using public spaces. Might as well have any money be used to improve the system instead of going back to out of state investors.

I agree that for a short-ish commute, the scooters are not a bad idea. However, once the weather starts looking "typical" (today's perfect weather is the anomaly) I'd take a bike's larger, more stable wheels over the tiny wheels of a scooter.

Oh I'm not dissing bicycling at all. I bike almost daily to get around. But finding bike parking can be tricky sometimes, and there are some times when I don't bike because it's bit too long or it's super hot and I don't want to get sweaty. I could see myself using an electric scooter in those cases. I will certainly continue to bike because I like the health benefits of it, but if I had a longer commute or needed to take commuter rail, I would certainly consider an electric scooter. In general, I think options are good.

So you "win" the battle to keep another Starbucks out of the neighborhood and now you're going to rally to keep other good ideas out, too?
The scooters, just like the bikes-- will happen, and without a scooter hub near the northend- there will be scooters all over the place. Many people will avoid trying to navigate the neighborhood in a crowded nIght, it's not worth the trouble.

Focus on making the neighborhood better for the residents, not dumb shit like scooters.

It kind of sucks, some companies like Lime, worked for months with the various towns to iron out details and do it the right way. Then a company like Bird just drops off their wares unannounced and gets everyones pants in a bunch. Makes all of these ride shares look bad.

Also, in Austin TX the city is LITTERED with these scooters. So much so that I thought there was a scooter convention in town or something..

Lime got off to a rough start, but their intent is good: they are working with the towns and I see solid evidence they're doing a quick job of reducing their initial locust-like plague down to the right size, and a much better job of distribution and placement.

Bird, on the other hand, can go eff right the eff off if they think they can just be another bunch of "disrupters".

So Says the Upper Class Suburban Pseudo Socialist who doesn't have to deal with this shit being parked on her no-doubt well-manicured Suburban lawn. Membership does have its rewards, now, doesn't it, Swirly.

Who almost ran down a cyclist in the bike lane, before blowing through a red light in the middle of Mass Ave rush hour tonight - It's people like you that ruin it for everyone! You're over 30, you've probably got a college degree - And you can't understand how effing stupid this is?